


Anachronistic

by skellerbvvt



Category: Merlin (TV), Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Angst, Dom/sub, M/M, Porn, Smut
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-09-22
Updated: 2010-09-22
Packaged: 2017-10-31 06:22:18
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,916
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/340920
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/skellerbvvt/pseuds/skellerbvvt
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Merlin and Sherlock are both "one of those things that aren't like the others" and thus gravitate towards one another.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Anachronistic

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Ramtops_Witch](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ramtops_Witch/gifts).



Magic was not logical. Or, perhaps, it retained logic, but most of its inter-workings were such that Sherlock could not pick them apart. Perhaps if he were another being- a creature like those Merlin has spoken of- he would be able to understand the inherent logic in magic: how it interacts with laws of nature, or maybe just the laws of human society. Perhaps if he had better technology than the MRI machines that fizzled out and, occasionally, exploded when introduced to Merlin’s busy mind. Not that Merlin's mind is busy like Sherlock’s.

Sherlock required constant upkeep to maintain himself at that perfect brink between intellect and simple, mindless insanity. Merlin simply was, and while that frustrated Sherlock, he reasons that if he could keep himself keen without effort, it would simply allow him more time to be bored.

And he so hated being bored.

Magic still had no satisfying explanation. Perhaps if there were other witches, or warlocks or wizards to examine, to test and prod, then he might achieve some satisfaction. But Merlin, simply, is the magical equivalent of Sherlock himself, and to understand magic through him is equal to attempting to understand human intellect through Sherlock. There were simply too many things taken for granted as understood to ever have solid grounding.

And Merlin just smiled and continued to putter around as if he were not so much more than the rest of the madding crowd, as if he were integral to the framework of the bell curve and not a fascinating outlier.

“Where did I leave my keys at?” Merlin asked, as if he hasn’t lived through the creation of correct and proper grammar, hasn’t read through the slow development of modern language and knew as well as Sherlock that he sounded foolish when he ended his statements with prepositions. As if Merlin could not simply flick his hand and his keys would simply _be there_. As if, even the flick of the hand is an affectation he has developed for the benefit of the people around him.

“Your left coat pocket.” Sherlock answered, because that’s where they were. Merlin reached into his pocket and pulls them out with a ridiculous cheerfulness. The keychain was a small plush and purple wizard that Merlin used as a good luck charm, one spot on the wizard’s robe rubbed thin by fingers seeking familiarity and comfort. Merlin had inoffensive clothing that was at least twenty five years old, worn past soft and into a stage where only Merlin’s affection and determination were keeping them together, he’d had his flat for right about two hundred, and just shrugged and made up stories to the revolving sets of landlords that he was the son of the previous tenant.

“But you are clearly not.” Sherlock had said, once.

“I don’t have to tell you that people like to believe what's easiest.” Merlin had shrugged and rubbed the back of his head in a facsimile of humble embarrassment, but his eyebrows were wrong. Merlin often forgot the details, depending far too often on people’s stupidity and need to misunderstand what did not come completely together under their bumbling fingers, and failing that, magic.

“Ah. Well. I am not people.” Sherlock had responded, simply and Merlin had just smiled at him.

Merlin’s flat was filled with furniture that had settled comfortably into the antique spectrum of age, diligently maintained with the barest of efforts, nothing newer than the Napoleonic Wars— when Merlin had obtained this flat and thus all of its additions. Merlin’s entire existence spoke of a man desperately trying to maintain some semblance of stability and normality in an existence that wore on through far too many decades. He still listened to vinyl records, and while Sherlock had badgered Merlin into accepting the gift of a mobile with texting capability, he kept it nestled in his left coat pocket entirely out of affection for Sherlock, rather than the uses of the technology itself.

“I can surf the Internet with my mind if I want.” Merlin had said when Sherlock silently noted that the mobile hadn’t even been smudged. “All these wavelengths shooting around like a cat’s cradle, huge signal patches and WiFi or whatever. It’s bloody distracting, is what it is.” Merlin had scowled at the signal tower visible from his kitchen. “One time I got lost in it. Just fell in and couldn’t get out for weeks. Wouldn’t of, probably, if I hadn’t done a Google search of myself and found me. I think.” He frowned. “Sometimes I wonder if I’m still in there.”

Merlin's grammar had, at one point in November 2002, taken a very noticeable hit judging from his journals, and Merlin was still prone to blurt out random, utterly pointless facts which he then followed by looking perplexed.

“It appears to be reality to me.” Sherlock had replied.

Merlin had smiled and then rubbed his eyes with the heel of his hand, a motion worn in by long practice. Some of Merlin gestures had the wear-soft texture of his clothing, and others were the crisp, oddly fitting suits of new affectations. Sherlock thought he could see the ghosts of old, abandoned habits in the wrinkles of Merlin’s hands and the half-forgotten twitches of his fingers—the way he reached upwards, into a coat pocket he no longer had, for tobacco and a pipe, or cigarettes, but no longer. Of course the second Merlin learned that cigarette smoke was dangerous to others he had stopped. Of course he had.

“What does it look like?” Sherlock had asked.

“Green.” Merlin had closed his curtains with a fierce snap. Letting out a hint of the curmudgeon he held tightly inside the body of a twenty five year old man. A twenty-five year old man, no less, from 500 AD—with a few necessary cosmetic changes, such as his teeth and skin, bringing it back to modern-day health standards. Sherlock had proven, to himself, that Merlin could not be from this decade with a simple test to investigate the amount of fluoride in one of Merlin’s teeth. It had not been nearly enough to account for a lifetime of drinking fluoridated water (Merlin’s body, in general, rejected chemical influences. Merlin had smoked socially, and drank socially, and nothing touched him. Not years and not inebriation.) The greater proof, was, of course, in the fact that Merlin could re-grow his molars at will.

Merlin’s flat was also in a state of constant disarray. He tossed his coat on the couch dripping books that were, at the moment, focused on the topic of dreams. Arthur again, then. They did not speak about Arthur, but the sleeping King’s presence was a heavy subject hanging about the atmosphere. Once, Merlin had said, after affecting drunkenness to the point he believed himself effected: “Your Destiny is coming, you know. I’m almost jealous.”

“There is no such thing as destiny, only probability and outside influences that people interpret with purpose it does not contain.” Sherlock had dismissed. He was willing to accept the possibility of magic—as the proof of it was indisputable— but that did not mean he was going to accept everything Merlin told him. Just because he could make pencils float in the air, didn’t also mean he didn’t frown when Sherlock bemoaned the inaccessibility of cocaine and ask when _that_ had gone and become illegal and for God’s sake _why_?

“You tell me that when your good Doctor comes.” Merlin had huffed. “He’ll be blond too. And a warrior, and he’ll care about everyone, and so even though you know he cares about you, you’ll wonder what that even means, really. Only yours won’t be dumb. Well…” Merlin had turned his glass, changing the color of the whiskey with an amused stare. Sherlock had come over to be entertained, but Merlin hadn’t been in the entertaining mood. “You won’t know why you like him either, but you will.”

“I have no doubts that I will eventually meet a fair-haired Doctor, but that doesn’t require that it was Destiny.” Sherlock dismissed again and then grinned with delight when Merlin pointed on the map that covered his kitchen table. “Is it an interesting one?”

“I know what you like,” Merlin had promised and gone back to dreamily turning his drink into mobile glimmering sparks of whimsy and depression. They were both given to moods: Sherlock’s could be cleared up by work, and Merlin’s…were less predictable.

Today, however, Merlin was not more legend than man, and had, in fact, gone to interview a potential witness for Sherlock, since Sherlock had been up for three days of his mind whirling—no, his mind did not whirl, it was not a windmill. It rushed, it ran in purposeful direction with glancing detours that he was steadily training out of it—and had no patience for the plebeian advances of misguided attempts to remember things “correctly” as if people did not reinvent themselves every other minute or so and forget 60% of their visual information before they could possibly verbalize it.

Sherlock honestly doesn't know how people survive through the day.

Simple psychological tests had shown time and time again that people’s ability for faces was a perfect wreck, holding on to one or two distinct features and losing the rest. How many miscarriages of justice had been served for people’s faulty occipital lobes? Too many.

Now the murderer had been found thanks to the fact that silver did not oxidize and the lack of bacteria growth inside cuts of red meat which was so _simple_ , and it was the fault of people for being so narrow-minded in what mattered to a crime—blood and hair and DNA, bah. As if DNA could tell him half as much about a person as the mud off their shoes.

Sherlock supposes he should sleep. He also knows Merlin will make him. That is, he realizes, why he followed Merlin home, instead of curling up in his own carefully articulated flat. Sherlock has a self-preservation instinct—or, at least, an understanding that if he does not rest his brain will betray him and he will have nothing—and if he went home he ran the risk of getting distracted and not going to sleep for another stretch longer until his body gave out, possibly leading to injury or death. Merlin, however, will force him to rest one way or another and then make sure Sherlock spends tomorrow entertained but somewhat under-stimulated.

Merlin turned to Sherlock. “Observing?”

“There is little left to deduce.” Sherlock replied, as Merlin did not change, and his flat did not change, and likely wouldn’t in Sherlock’s lifetime. He checked from time to time, but Merlin was trying his best to lock himself in a crystal cave that he’d used as a heavy-handed literary metaphor as he continued his quest to make sure he and Arthur were not forgotten.

Merlin grinned and then began to undress Sherlock, who frowned at him, but let himself be manhandled, since his body had once again failed him and gone leaden and displeased with movement, muscles refusing any more strenuous action without the bribe of rest. And he would be sore tomorrow, bugger.

Merlin hung up Sherlock’s coat, Sherlock’s scarf tucked into the pocket. Merlin removed his jacket and Sherlock moved his arms to allow him and undid his own buttons.

Merlin mumbled something Sherlock pretended he didn’t hear about men who only knew how to wear one color as he bent down and undid the laces of Sherlock’s shoes and threw him and utterly pleased smile at discovering Sherlock’s pink socks. “You rebel.”

“It is an exercise of people’s attention. No one notices socks even when they’re completely nonsensical, unless their attention is specifically drawn to them.”

“Try silly belt buckles next.” Merlin insisted and then wandered off from undressing Sherlock and Sherlock followed him, barefoot and bare-chested, and bare seconds from baring all in Merlin’s wide canopy bed and either falling asleep naturally, or through Merlin stroking his hair as is he were a child. Which he is _not_ —his brain is fully and completely developed, which he is deeply displeased by as it just means that his synapses will start shutting down instead of developing.

Unless he is blissfully saved from this decline by being murdered himself, he will grow old and slow. This was why men had children, so they could use their decline to shape the genius of another. Sherlock still hoped he’d be murdered, hopefully in a fascinating way—how terrible to be killed in a simple mugging or car accident. Sherlock desperately wishes that he had the sort of arch-nemesis that would try and kill him instead of invite him ‘round for Sunday Roast and ask about if he’s made any headway in this whole “being a human being” business.)

“You could always invite me to roast too,” Merlin had offered once. “I’m a friend. We’re friends. He can’t make pitying eyes at you when you have friends. And I can make him trip over things. And then we can laugh about it. As friends.”

Sherlock allowed himself a beautiful, luxurious moment where he considered that—closing his eyes and imagining his brother sprawled out over the floor, but better, the expression on his face because he would _know_ there hadn’t been anything to trip over, but equally that Sherlock was too far away to have done anything. It would be _delicious_.

“This is the precise reason why I do not do what you are proposing,” Sherlock had said, eventually. His brother was very charming, in a position of power, and much less difficult to socially stand than Sherlock. Given the option between the two it would be logical to strike up a friendship with Mycroft, and to contact Sherlock if there happened to be a murder.

“He’s really not going to steal me away.” Merlin had replied. “I don’t like politics. I like running around and killing griffins. Actually, I don’t like that much either. I like a nice night in more than out, especially a night out getting nearly killed. I did like the unicorn though, but Arthur killed it.”

“Did something perfectly horrible happen in return?” Sherlock asked, having known many of Merlin’s stories, and how they generally ended in Merlin having to save Arthur’s life in some desperate, underhanded, illogical manner and get no appreciation for it. Sherlock solves things in a clean, underhanded, excited, logical manner and thus receives free dinners frequently and the occasional fruit basket. He tends to give Merlin the fruit baskets. Sherlock does not enjoy fruit. It's so damnably _healthy_.

“Of course,” Merlin smiled, eyes vague with remembering. “But it worked out in the end.”

“Is this a metaphor?”

“No. A unicorn is a horse with a horn.” Merlin had preened like he thought himself clever. “And I solemnly promise not to like Mycroft better than you. I learned to associate charming with evil, and I can never quite shake that.”

“I see.” Sherlock had said, frowning.

Merlin had lifted his eyebrows and looked as cheerful as Christmas.

Sherlock had grumbled that Merlin liked _everyone_ , but he’d known it wasn’t true when he said it. Merlin was friendly towards everyone, even (especially) if they were rude to him, up until they decided to harm others, at which point he no longer liked them and took them to task until they repented, wherein he began to hesitantly like them again. He was, though, dutifully wary around anyone who was too kind to him and tended to regard anyone charming with a deep suspicion. He was still _friendly_ to them, he just made no time for them in his life.

Merlin would drop anything he was doing at Sherlock’s behest, and at the end of Sherlock’s cases, Merlin took it upon himself to kidnap Sherlock and bring him to his flat and recharge him. And Sherlock reasons if he calls his mind a hard drive and his body transport, that at some point both need to be plugged in and fueled up before he could be expected to do anything else. He just never remembers to _do_ all the dull little details necessary for life, because they are so _boring_. Why should he eat when he could _read_? One day they would invent books that could sustain the body as well as the mind and Sherlock would be very happy.

Sherlock crawled into the bed and arranged himself into something suitably dignified and comfortable, pulling the covers up to his chest, nestling the pillow under his head and then staring at the ceiling.

“Need help?” Merlin asked, after a strained moment. Sherlock closed his eyes and before he could round out an irritated _No_ Merlin huffed, “No, of course you do.”

Sherlock opened his eyes to watch him.

Merlin sat on the edge of the bed and ran his fingers through Sherlock’s hair. Sherlock closed his eyes, again, at the caress. He did not, normally, welcome contact of any sort, unless it was to help him understand a person-their pulse, their temperature, how dry their skin was, so on and endlessly so forth, but Merlin has a relatively narcotic effect upon Sherlock's body, and he does, in the end, relish the addiction free buzz. The tingle radiating down from his scalp and wrapping up around his spine—relaxing his muscles until even his eyes felt relaxed and unfocused, until his jaw went slack and his head flopped towards the side. Normally, given a preference, he tends towards chemicals with stimulating effects as opposed to relaxing ones. But he cannot even bring himself to care, now, that he's drifting off, because he’s been drenched in a perfect, warm languor that he can never accomplish without help. The best he does on his own is a fitful sort of exhaustion.

He sighed into the touch. Merlin smiled at him—Sherlock can’t see it, but it’s never a poor guess to assume Merlin is smiling— and continued stroking through his hair, soft and quiet and soothing. “Go to sleep, Sherlock.”

He doesn’t exactly _enjoy_ having to be gentled like a startled pet, but a man could die if he went without sleep for 10 days—much faster than he could die without food—and Sherlock had, for the most part, lost the trick of it. He’d forgotten how to make himself run _down_ instead of _go faster_. Sleeping pills just made him a stumbling and woozy mess, upset how slow his thoughts solidified, and eventually, abandon him still awake: nauseated and frustrated.

Merlin, thankfully, had no side effects and was not, chemically at least, addicting. Sherlock really didn’t have a problem with growing dependent upon outside stimuli. He should, probably, but Merlin hadn’t moved from this flat since 1800, it seemed unlikely that he was going to go anywhere until forced to go somewhere. He was sentimental and clung to familiarity, he was lonely and he insisted Sherlock was a hero. Merlin stayed around heroes, and if Sherlock hadn’t convinced Merlin yet that he was not, then Merlin wasn’t going to be convinced. He was much more stable than cocaine, and Sherlock hadn’t had a problem getting addicted to that either and only gave it up when it got in the way of solving crime.

Sherlock sighed and finally gave himself over to that final push into sleep.

\---

If Sherlock were to borrow Merlin's main frame of reference for the universe and thought himself the character in story, he wouldn’t have to deal with this nonsense. Everything extraneous would be cut out, he could race through a day, a month, a year in quick, pointed scenes. He'd always be caught in the middle of a thickening plot and a piling body count, forever useful and forever brilliant. He was not a creature made to deal with remembering the milk, and taxes and to grab the post. When he built himself out of flesh and books he didn't leave room for cleaning up after himself, sleeping or _eating_. He was made to solve crimes, he has memorized every detail pertaining to who people are and what they do to the world around them, but he is in an age where there are CCTVs and gun bans and other misunderstood geniuses out solving crimes, and honestly, there really weren't that many murders in London, certainly not many that weren't easily solved by a cursory glance at the details.

And, even if he expanded beyond murder, criminals are hardly masterminds. If a car was broken into, it was because the perpetrator needed to steal your stereo, likely for drugs, and was, no doubt, someone who lived near enough that your car was a convenient target. Simple. Boring. Plebeian. There weren't enough puzzles. Not enough for him, anyways, and surely not enough of any note. They are all muggings, or domestic disputes, or school children going mad and taking out their classmates.

He was not made for an age of forensics, digital recordings, and online blogs.

Sherlock, when he the rare moment comes along that he considers it, thinks this is why he and Merlin got on, whereas normally Sherlock was, at best, tolerated. They were charmingly anachronistic together. Merlin wasn't made for a time of reality television and celebrity twitters, not made for a world with jets that break the sound barrier and war is fought on computers. They are not designed for decades of Kevlar, robotics and corporate espionage.

When Sherlock was in one of his depressions he swept his dressing gown around himself and wonders what age he was meant for, then, if this one is so ill fitting. It isn't that he believes in some beautiful Golden Age that has sense passed, no, no point in London's existence would be interesting enough for him. But there would, perhaps, be one that was the right _sort_ of interesting. It’s not his career choice—no, that couldn’t be, not with the way it fulfills and thrills him so perfectly—its just he feels as if the timing is wrong. As if he walked in late, now that there are blood splatter analysts, and forensic anthropologists, and, yes, none of them can seem to put it all together because they’re so specialized as to be useless, but… and that train of thought had just caused him to go silent and unapproachable for days, because when he wasn’t on the case, he felt like the world was trying to reject him like an incompatible organ.

When he woke up, he felt almost charitable toward the world being at such peace, since he was, for a moment, in harmony with it. He inhaled into waking and slowly opened his eyes from the warm, dark place he’d been wrapped up in, into the familiar folds and corners of Merlin’s bedroom. He’d moved in his sleep, curled in on himself and it took him a moment to look past his hands, curled up on the pillow to Merlin’s intent, blue eyes.

Merlin doesn’t watch him sleep, his cheek is never creased by the pillow, the bed only passingly warm from his presence, he just knows when Sherlock will wake up. Sherlock doesn’t need to glance at the ornamental clock to know he’s slept eighteen hours, exactly. The clock is worthy of note, given that there’s probably only the one of it, and it’s undoubtedly extremely expensive, boarding on priceless, seeing as the clock itself is clearly a 1715 Quare, with the decoration being a mixture of Petit porcelain dragons holding silver balls over open-mouthed pewter frogs—crafted by no one Sherlock knew, but they were skilled.

Merlin had become entirely obsessed with clockwork when it was invented and his flat was filled with tiny geared extravagances that would keep on ticking as long as Merlin was around to wind them.

Or maybe it wouldn’t sell, seeing as how Quare and Petit hadn’t been alive at the same time, and the frogs were clearly Industrial Revolution circa America work judging from the smelting and mold techniques, and given the flaws in the pewter, that is a fair degree more lead than silver, crafted by a poor, if skilled, artisan.

Merlin was curled up next to him on the bed, not touching, mirroring Sherlock’s position. Or maybe Sherlock was mirroring Merlin’s. He wasn't certain, and it didn't matter.

Merlin had food, a tray with a sandwich, a pickle and a glass of milk, and so Sherlock rubbed his face and sat up, taking the tray and eating as Merlin watched him. The tray itself if early Victorian age silver. Sherlock studied it, in anyone else’s possession he would assume it a cherished family heirloom of unknown value—seeing as how it was polished to a stunning gleam, but not locked in a china cabinet in the living room. Merlin had a bottle of 1898 Moet Chandon champagne, but as all 300 bottles of said champagne that had been salvaged from 1919 shipwrecked _RMS Republic_ , though, obviously, not inflicted with the same sulfur producing deep sea bacteria as aforementioned bottles. Sherlock had no particular interest in wines for their own sake, but Merlin's wine cellar was a thing of historical fascination, and, of course, worth a disgustingly large amount of money.

Merlin had Renaissance era paintings (not from anyone Sherlock has heard of, but Merlin is deeply pleased by them), and first edition copies of Eliot, Lewis, Dickinson, and Dante, he has original illuminated scrolls, has stories written in hieroglyphics pressed into papyrus, has scrapbooks full of notes from famous authors, scribbled away on coffee napkins and scraps of notebook paper. He also has a well-worn first edition of _The Velveteen Rabbit_ and _Where the Wild Things Are_ , a small row of ankle bone dice, and any number of knick-knacks and trinkets for cultures that has no foothold on the present day, so Sherlock (of course) knows nothing of them, other than the space they take up on Merlin's shelf or floor. Merlin had, at Sherlock’s last count, over 200 more books then his three bookcase allot space for, but if Sherlock were to go to the living room, there they would all be: tucked neatly away and the book he wanted resting just under his randomly placed fingertips.

Merlin’s flat, was, in general, very helpful when it came to Sherlock's needs, and Sherlock was rather terminally disappointed that his own flat was not.

“Want to hear something no one else has heard before?” Merlin asked as Sherlock continued to eat his ham sandwich. He liked sandwiches: they were portable and generally could contain all the necessary components for a healthy adult male diet.

“What is it?” Sherlock asked.

It could be anything, really, that Merlin was thinking of. Merlin recorded everything, and kept the bits he loved best close at hand. He was a walking mp3 player for history. Sherlock had heard the castrati (though Merlin still referred to him as an _evirato_ and spoke of him and Metastasio fondly) Farinelli in the prime of his singing career, singing Orlandini’s _Antigona_ alongside Bernacchi, the two of them sounding… it was hard to describe, exactly, but the musician in him understood why so many young boys were castrated in the desperate hope they would become _that_.

Sherlock had heard the premier of Mozart’s _Idomeneo_ , he’d closed his eyes to the thunderous pound of fully-armed Byzantine cavalry in full charge. He’d heard Napoleon’s voice rattling French off to his wife and his troops, heard a conversation between Merlin and a young Winston Churchill, between Merlin and a drawling Mark Twain, a heated debate between Thomas Jefferson and John Adams, the philosophy of Charles Babbage as he invented computer science before people properly understood electricity, to Merlin and a disinterested Geoffrey Chaucer.

Merlin could fill the room with the sounds of the French Revolution, or the pound and blast of London in the middle of a Blitz, the clinks and clanks of famous laboratories at work, he could pull voices from history—voices that sounded like there were alive and in the room rather than heard from a recording or over the phone. Merlin could make the windows shake with thunderous applause, the air hum with whale song echoing back and forth over the ocean. Merlin had the slap of waves against a British Man-Of-War and Amelia Earheart’s last transmission, had police constables worrying over Jack the Ripper.

“You stopped him, didn’t you? No, of course you did. November 1888, you were still in London, then, and he was never caught, nor did he kill again. You couldn’t let him keep killing, and you don’t get involved in anything that would mean you’d be famous for the wrong reasons. Catching the world’s most famous serial killer would have put you on the map. Who was it? Was Smith one of them? I’d never thought so, personally. Unrelated gang violence, there are precious few enough serial killers, much less serially killing gangs, especially since there was no motivation for the murders. No one famous, then, if you killed them.” And Merlin would have killed him. Merlin had no reservations about killing people as so long as those people were murderers themselves.

Merlin had looked at Sherlock then away.

“Were they just the five?’ Sherlock had asked.

“No,” Merlin had said, “There were a lot more than five.”

Sherlock had frowned. “The alleged victims? But the MO doesn’t fit—Don’t tell me it was magic.” He had scowled. “I will be vexed if he was magic. The only reason he was never caught was entirely due to shoddy police work.”

“Not magic.” Merlin had said, “Magic proper left when Arthur fell. I’m the only one who has it anymore. There's still bits of it, floating around, but not. Nothing big.”

“So?”

“If you had been there, you would have solved it with Stride. He got sloppy with Stride.” Merlin had looked at his hands. “But you weren’t.” And that was all Merlin would say about it. He occasionally recounted interesting crimes of the past, but he never remembered all the correct details, and so it was mostly an exercise in frustration.

Sherlock sometimes thought that maybe the era he belongs in is Jack The Ripper’s London. He would have beat the answer out of Whitechapel by force, if need be. But, then, Jack the Ripper was hardly special, and entirely too sensationalized, so, perhaps not.

When they listened, Merlin would stare up at the ceiling as they listened, hands cupped and the sounds pouring out and whistling through the air, making them as real and viable as an actual experience. When finished he would close his hands and then look back at Sherlock.

Merlin didn’t respond this time, sometimes he would, sometimes, like in this instance, he just gently opened his hands, letting out whatever he wanted Sherlock to hear. This time it was brief, just a quick, startled chuckle. It didn’t mean anything to Sherlock, just a laugh like any other laugh—not immediately irritating, not particularly interesting, a baritone, likely surprised to find he was laughing given the brevity. It was short, and clear and Merlin had his eyes closed tightly, fingers curled in protectively like he could defend the noise.

Something precious to him, something he wanted to be real. He was holding his breath and body still, tense, mouth fighting off a frown after the laugh ended, just as it had been relishing a smile when it had started.

Arthur, then. Obvious.

Sherlock had assumed that Merlin didn’t have any sounds from before 1,100 AD (which was the earliest he’d ever shown Sherlock), but apparently he had a few samples that he was simply possessive of. He was showing these to Sherlock as a cue: Merlin was lonely and missing Arthur. Merlin had his own moods and depressions, but it was more difficult to guess at their origin. Even for Sherlock.

Sherlock studied Merlin’s face as Merlin opened his eyes, clapping his hands shut. He didn’t look back right away, just let out a long breath and inhaled sharply afterward, body relaxing into the bed before he met Sherlock's gaze.

“I don’t remember what I’d done.” Merlin said, “That’s the thing of it. He was probably laughing _at_ me, to be honest. But I don’t remember.” Merlin knitted his fingers and turned to Sherlock, who had finished his milk in a few long gulps. He floated the tray out of the way. “You wouldn’t have liked him.”

“I imagine not. I don’t like most people.” Sherlock sniffed. He doesn’t. He doesn’t dislike them either. People are rather just sort of _there._

Merlin closed his eyes again. “You know what it’s like?”

“No,” Sherlock said, because he doesn’t know what waiting for someone one could barely remember for 1,500 years is like. He doesn’t wait for people; they either catch up with him, or were left behind.

“Waiting for a new case.” Merlin sat, then drew his knees up, used them to prop up his elbows, and then rocked forward, putting his hands on the back of his neck. Sherlock watches and thinks if he were someone else he’d offer comfort.

“You get cranky after a week with nothing new to do, which is fine, I get it,” Merlin added, “You just sort of knocked out the bottom few rungs of the Maslow Hierarchy of Needs pyramid, and just sort of chill in the need for self-actualization. Or, well.” Merlin squints at him, “And Esteem need. You want attention. No, you do.”

Sherlock does _not_ need to enjoy the general esteem of others. He _is_ a unique individual with self-respect, and if everyone else stopped being idiots, then maybe he might care more about general respect. As is, he’s the world’s only consulting detective and will likely be recognized for his achievements after he’s died and people can forget that he was unpleasant to be around. People do that.

“But me? I’ve had the physiological needs taken care of for ages, and you can’t get much more secure then being the only warlock left on the planet. But I can’t get the other three. I’m _stuck_ and it just keeps _going_ , because I have to wait on that giant prat to decide to wake up.”

Sherlock was unsure of what he’s supposed to do. So he slowly reached and puts his hand through Merlin’s hair, mimicking Merlin's tendency to pet Sherlock. Merlin stopped digging his nails in the back of his neck and turned to look at Sherlock.

“We’re bad for each other, you know. Like…really bad. You can’t give me what I need, and I…” He paused, “Well I could kill someone for you, but I think you’d know it was me, so I can’t give you what you need either. Except for the physiological bits. You need those whether you like it or not.”

Sherlock removed his hand and nearly got up to storm off, except he can hardly leave in a suitably dramatic manner, undressed as he is. And the flat will hide his clothing, he was certain. The flat is an incorrigible romantic.

“Your Doctor will be good for you, though.” Merlin rubbed his face. “You can’t have two larger than life characters play narrator for each other. It doesn’t work. You need the passive narrator. He’ll be a writer, your Doctor. Try not to stop him from doing it, it’s sort of important, I think. Blogging. Even if you take offense at his titles.”

“Boring,” Sherlock said, “Don’t be dull, Merlin. I don’t broke with passivity.”

“He won’t be passive, though.” Merlin frowns, “Not properly. He’ll be easy-going.”

“Delightful.” Sherlock says. “I still don’t believe you can read the future. It’s far more likely that you arrange it. Though it leads me to wonder why you’re arranging me to have someone who fulfills your function when you’re still…” Sherlock frowns. No. Merlin can’t be leaving. He wouldn’t leave, desperate for similar space as he is. He goes through periods of loneliness all the time. this one doesn’t appear different. He hasn’t packed…but he wouldn’t need to.

Merlin looks at him. “I didn’t arrange it. Some things just happen no matter what, just because they do. Or always do. Or should. I don’t know.”

Sherlock doesn't know what to say. He wanted to leave, because if Merlin is just going to _go_ , what is the point of him, anyways?

“Neither was Arthur. Passive. I mean. I wonder which one of us was supposed to tell that story. But thankfully some jerk poets took that out of my hands. I wrote it down myself, but I couldn’t get it published. I might be able to today as a more than somewhat homoerotic romance novel.” he paused to consider this. “Arthur would make a horrible romantic hero. He woo’d people with chicken. And he put me in the stocks. I don’t even know why I like him.”

Merlin had a long held grudge against Lord Alfred Tennyson, which was, of course, nothing close to his furious hatred of Sir Tomas Malory—a man who he complained about viciously as he slammed about his flat. Sherlock didn’t keep track of what he yelled about, because Arthurian Legend wasn’t important for his work, and, for that matter, it was always incorrect. Sherlock didn’t memorize things that were inaccurate.

“Well, you’ve slept and ate, I’ve got some fluids in you, so onto the next.” Merlin turned and Sherlock watches as Merlin slipped a hand under Sherlock’s jaw, brushed against his throat and then curled it against the back of Sherlock’s neck, tight and fond. “You want anything special?”

Sherlock looked him over, though he doesn’t need the pause. He knew exactly what he wanted when he followed Merlin home, just as he always did. The ritual wass the same for every post-case engagement:

Merlin makes sure Sherlock sleeps;

Merlin makes sure Sherlock eats and drinks something;

Merlin makes sure Sherlock’s libido is satisfied (which, depending, can either take a very short or a very long time. Merlin often accuses him of being a sexual camel, but he simply views it as when he is _on_ he is on, and when he is off, he is off. There is no middle ground.);

Merlin makes sure Sherlock is showered, cleaned and properly groomed;

Merlin will feed and water him once more, and finally;

Merlin will send Sherlock back off into the world. Sometimes with an affectionate pat on the bum that Sherlock will glower at him for, sometimes with a package full of freshly made scones, oftentimes both.

It is a small oasis of routine that Sherlock found…relaxing, and Merlin finds steadying. Merlin, Sherlock knew, missed doting over someone and Sherlock took horrible advantage of it. He would text Merlin for tea, and look up to see a tea service on the table next to him. It was rather nice, all things told. But now Merlin is going to go, and Sherlock is supposed to be satisfied that he'll get some sort of replacement who will _not_ be magic, and therefore, entirely too predictable.

Merlin was staring pointedly at Sherlock’s jawbone, tracing up the curve of it, from ear to chin and back again. His hand was warm and dry on the back of Sherlock’s neck—Merlin ran very hot, near feverish, but never flushed or sweating— and his fingers were firm where they rested, digging in slightly, four points of pressure against the tendon of Sherlock’s neck and forcing it to relax. His thumb brushes back and forth at the nape: familiar, comfortable, simple, straightforward. Merlin was wonderfully blunt when it came to softer comforts.

Sherlock extracted Merlin’s hand from his hair and got up, up off the bed and went to Merlin’s closet. He opens it and snapped one of Merlin’s ugly, unfashionable 1960-era ties from the hanger he keeps them on, clicking his fingers and pointing away from the bed. Merlin got up, watching Sherlock without an ounce of fear or distrust in his body. Of course not. What does Merlin have to fear from Sherlock?

“Undress.” He added, as he works.

Sherlock pulled back the covers with a snap, leaving them on the floor and tossing the pillows in besides them. “Fold those,” because otherwise they’d be in his way and distract him. Merlin sighed and mumbled to himself in Old English, but grumbling was the same in all languages.

Sometimes Sherlock would take longer to set up: he’d manipulate the smell of the room with candles, or burning oil, or incense—since they were all conveniently nearby. He’d hang curtains around the bed, or add lamps, or open the windows, adjust mirrors and otherwise play with the light, sometimes beaming them all towards the bed, sometimes making it dark except subtle, quiet glows, depending on what he wanted to focus on. He controlled the sounds, played records or mp3’s, putting Merlin in ear plugs, or playing white noise. He fiddled with the temperature ceaselessly, knocking it up and down degrees until everything was exactly the way he wanted it. He liked the details, he didn't like planning, exactly, but he liked to see steps ahead and commit to them.

When the room was set up to his specifications, he would then move to Merlin in order to make him react and look the exact way he desired. He worked for that one perfect moment where the cello music, unwilling gasps, desperate moans, and shuddering inhales, combined with the blue drapes. When the faint smell of jasmine, sweat, arousal, wood and smoke, combined with the texture of skin, hair, silk, leather and teeth. When the angles of Merlin’s elbows, and the flush of his skin, and the heat of the room were all pitched perfectly. The moment when everything fell exactly, perfectly into place for one timeless second that he could relish later in the slog of boredom. Sherlock’s life revolved around such seconds.

But he doesn't have the patience for that tonight.

He straightened the soft-well worn cotton sheet over the mattress and then snapped his fingers and points to the headboard. “On your back.”

Merlin didn't talk, not yet. He didn't flush or sweat, his pulse stayed steady and his pupils didn't dilate. Right now Sherlock was setting up, putting everything where he wanted it before he interacted. Merlin might as well be one of the pillows, at that moment, for all the attention Sherlock was paying to tantalize him. Sherlock liked the details, and he was careful to set them up to his liking.

Once done Sherlock dragged Merlin’s hands up and over his head, Merlin’s elbows sharp in the air, his eyes following as far as they could. Sherlock tied his wrists tight. Merlin could free himself, but he would, just like Sherlock could release himself from any knot anyone could put him in, but often did not. People said different things when they thought they were in a position of power. Merlin tugged against the tie, fingers fisting and straightening, before falling into a relaxed, forgotten, curl.

Merlin watched him, eyes dark and the sort of blue that insured that that particular genetic mutation would continue far off into the future, because it was just so distractingly vibrant. There was probably poetry to be found in how strong the pigment of Merlin’s iris was, especially in comparison to the glacier shade of Sherlock’s own, but Sherlock was not a poet. He didn't like games that didn't have clear, defined goals, that didn't have clear winners and losers. One couldn't _win_ at poetry, one can only, perhaps, _succeed_ , and commercial success was such a horrible meter of actual worth.

He was not sure if his interest in Merlin was vanity or simply loneliness—they did have similar coloring and Sherlock was very self-involved. But Merlin’s body stayed determinedly younger, and his skin—while maintaining the same pallor as Sherlock’s— was inked in a spiraling, nonsensically complicated pattern of thick, curving lines that Sherlock can never force his eyes to focus on all at once. Sometimes he thought he saws things in the swirls—towns and maps and the fangs of dragons—and sometimes he thought he could remember some small section of it—the curl under Merlin’s left nipple, the possessive curve of lines over his right hip—but then he’d look again and discover he'd been mistaken. It didn't even photograph properly so Sherlock let it be, for the most part. He only occasionally took up the pursuit of understanding it, holding Merlin down to trace the lines and try to force meaning out of them. He doesn’t ask what it is.

Sherlock can accept that there are things he wants to know, but never will. Like who Jack the Ripper was, and what magic is, and why Merlin sought him out (because he _did_ , he sought Sherlock out _specifically_ and he doesn’t need to be the man he is to know that.) He can accept it, but not at all once. And he cannot accept that there are things he will never know, and that Merlin is going to pick up and take all those answers with him. That is beyond his ability to accept.

Merlin watched him and wiggled. “Can we go now?”

“Impatient.”

“Oh, because you’re just a _fountain_ of serenity,” Merlin replied. “Come on, it’s been four weeks, you’re usually dying for it by now.”

He liked endorphins, but sex was, normally, comprised of far too many other things he did not like to bother perusing them. Sherlock straightened again, ran his hand up Merlin’s chest and grasped his throat, tilting Merlin’s head up and feeling Merlin’s pulse quicken under his hand.

“How many lovers have you had?” He asked, hand steady and eyes peering down into Merlin’s. He could choke him, if he wanted. Nearly kill him if he wanted. See Merlin grow lax and his struggles—if there were any—feeble. He could press down on Merlin’s trachea and Merlin’s hips would thrust into the air, his legs would shift and wiggle in the binding of the sheet. He would want the hand around his throat and he would want Sherlock’s other hand around his cock and he wouldn’t fight. He would just keep looking up at Sherlock until Sherlock released his throat and Merlin would gasp like Sherlock had given him air instead of having been the one to take it away.

Merlin swallowed under Sherlock’s hand. “Twenty.”

“Only twenty?”

Merlin nodded, jawbone digging into the knuckles of his thumb and forefinger. Merlin is not solid, he is not beefy or thick or full. He is, however, extremely present in a way that Sherlock cannot forget or delete. He was always undeniably there.

“And how well did they have you trained, Merlin?” He asked, stroking his thumb down Merlin’s artery, invested in the pump of blood and the heart that had beat more times then any heart had any right to. “No.” He interrupted, “how well did _he_ have you trained?”

Merlin flushed, spottily and deep. Sherlock leaned forward, smiling to himself. “Did you think I wouldn’t notice, Merlin? Really? So simple. You don’t just _miss_ him, you don’t just _love_ and pine for him, no. People who are simply in love forget. Widowers remarry, lovers cheat, long distance relationships fail. Love makes one do stupid things, but not for this long. Not sustained this completely.” Sherlock bent to sniff Merlin’s skin, the musk eking out of his pores, the heat and the spice and salt. “You crave him. And you select one person every so often who might be able to tide you over, don’t you? Just for a little while.” Sherlock pulled away and pushed Merlin’s head back, “someone to serve.”

“Are you just figuring thi-”

“I’m not Arthur, Merlin. I don’t invite backtalk.” Sherlock interrupted, “I have, of course, known this for as long as I’ve know who you are, but you are having an especially bad night tonight. The craving is worse and I’m your dealer of choice at the moment. So, Merlin, since you have gone to so much trouble, it seems only fair I perform the job you’ve chosen for me.”

“It’s not-“

“Don’t be tiresome, Merlin. Of course there are other aspects to our relationship, but this,” he squeezes Merlin’s jaw, “ _This_ is the core of it. So, just as you do for me, I’m going to give you what you need whilst denying you want you want."

Merlin went quiet and Sherlock was pleased he doesn’t ask what Sherlock thinks he wants. That answer is too painfully obvious, too disgustingly clear. Instead, Sherlock got up and gets dressed. His clothing was folded on a chair just outside the room and he let Merlin wait. He didn't require materials, and his own sex drive had been subsumed by wanting to pick Merlin apart. Puzzles are, of course, always more interesting than physical exertion.

He continued to straighten his cuffs as he stepped in. “What is it like?” He asked. “Living each day and knowing that there’s nothing you can accomplish, really, that would make you feel better? Even after 1,500 years, you’re still waiting for him. And not just waiting, you still follow his rules. You still do the tiny things you’d do to annoy him—the backtalk, for one, is clearly a behavior that you were conditioned to employ _extremely_ often. You had to irritate him first, had to drive him half mad wanting to hold you down and fuck his annoyance and need and love into you, because he wouldn’t on his own, would he?”

Merlin began to respond and Sherlock merely slips three fingers into his mouth. Merlin’s eyes fluttered and his lips wrapped tight as he began to suck like Sherlock pushed a button. “How could he not notice? You’re so desperate for it, for someone to push you down on your knees and keep you there. Not out of force—you could escape whenever you wanted—but you love like you don’t know how to stop.” Sherlock stroked Merlin’s tongue and Merlin swallows around his fingers, staring up at Sherlock. "You are the biggest idiot I have ever seen in my life."

Merlin made a choked, desperate noise and that, too, was nothing new. Sherlock insulted people who were beneath him because _everyone_ was beneath him, and Merlin was the only one who didn't so much _not mind_ as he did _enjoy_ the abuse.

“Ah. I wouldn’t like him, you said. An idiot, both of you. You had been pushing and pushing in the exact same ways, and he continued to resist no matter how hard you tried. Romance,” Sherlock spat, “so repetitive.” He tugged Merlin’s mouth open and removed his fingers. Merlin left it wide and open, jaw slack and saliva pooling under his tongue and dripping off his teeth.

“And he never did give it to you, did he? Never gave you what you _wanted_. He would be your King and your Lord, but he never took you to bed—no. No.” Sherlock frowned, rubbing his thumb on Merlin’s bottom lip. “Once, he did. Before he died, and you knew it was going to happen. Had to have known, had to have seen it all slotting along and you not knowing how to get out. So you asked and he gave and he was…” Sherlock removed his hand, “Gentle, with you. All that waiting and he was _gentle_. And then he was dead.”

Merlin looked away and Sherlock grabbed his hair and twisted it until Merlin looked back, pulling with the same inexorable pressure until Merlin relented.

“And you wanted him to own you, because you gave yourself so, very, completely. And now you search out possessive, socially inept, savants who will insult you, and need you, and keep you. And I am possessive. I am not like him at all. I am brilliant, and possessive and I am never gentle. If you were mine I would bite you until everyone knew the exact spacing of my teeth.” Sherlock looked over Merlin’s body. He bit down hard and sudden on Merlin’s pectoral. The mark bloomed starkly red against Merlin skin and Merlin's whole body jerked and rode the tension like it was made for it. He didn't rise. Sherlock bit again and tugged back, made it hurt. He didn't try and tantalize. He just wanted the mark real, red and there.

“I wouldn’t share you with anyone. Even your free time. I would want you to myself, to use when I needed you. And it was be using, wouldn’t it? I would use you and then, when there was a case, forget you were there. You’d help me, of course, but you will live for those brief moments when my attention was on you. When my only relief from myself was to pick you apart.”

Merlin shuddered and swallowed, hard, eyes squeezed closed and Sherlock swung himself to crouch over Merlin. “Keep your eyes open. I’m not him.”

“I’m-”

Sherlock pressed his hand over Merlin’s mouth and Merlin squeezes his jaw shut. “You are. And I am not him. I do not fancy myself a hero, or an honorable man. I would manipulate you to need only me. I can see right through you, most of the time, and what I cannot see or observe or deduce I would pry out of you. I would take advantage of every single inch of need you had for my own wishes and desires. I wouldn’t be repentant about it, either, because I have no morals, and you would love it. You would just keep bending no matter how far I pushed you, because that’s what you were made for. What you’ve made yourself into. I would care about you, I wouldn't love you, but I would have you completely.”

Merlin was hard, but that was secondary. Secondary to how he was staring, entranced, into Sherlock’s eyes, like Sherlock was the one with the magic. His arousal was secondary to how his body was limp under Sherlock’s how he’s craned his head to show his neck, and the long line of his exposed stomach, and how everything about his posture and body chemistry and expression is _begging_ for Sherlock to make action of his words.

But he was hard, and Sherlock wasn't going to touch him, wasn't going to wrap his hand around the loose skin of Merlin’s cock and tease him. Wasn’t going to lower his head and suck on the very tip of his dick until Merlin’s legs flailed, kicked and twitched on Sherlock’s shoulders. He wasn't going to just leave it there, getting harder, and needing more. He wasn’t going to touch it at all. Merlin was just going to have to thrust into the air, because Sherlock doesn't care about physicality right now.

He was not here to give Merlin relief. He was here to push until Merlin didn’t care if he came or not.

“I would make it obvious to everyone. I wouldn’t leave a detail to chance, because if one of them touched you, if one of them misinterpreted and tried to flirt with you…” Sherlock removed his hand and returned to sitting on the edge of the bed. “But they wouldn’t. I wouldn’t let anyone steal you. You'd have an implant here.” Sherlock said, touching Merlin’s forearm, “so I could trace your location anywhere in the world. A tattoo, of course, one people could read and properly see, so even when I’d died and you had knelt at the end of my grave for years people would know you were, in your heart, still mine. Even though you knew I was never coming back, you'd still be mine. Even when Arthur woke up, he'd look at you and know that it didn't matter that I was dead, because I had claimed up utterly. I would be selfish about it. I'd want you not to know how to live without me. It wouldn’t be a game, but you knew that.”

Merlin licked his lips and his hips shifted in the air, legs falling open a little wider and abdomen twitching. He’ll make a mess of his belly, because his cock would start leaking soon enough.

“It won’t end there, of course. A collar is a given, and I wouldn’t do a thing to disguise it. They already think I’m a freak at the police station, it wouldn’t hurt my reputation any to drag you on the end of a lead as I investigated a crime scene. If I couldn’t bring you in I’d tie you to a lamppost. Just to be sure you didn’t wander off.” He stroked down Merlin’s cheekbone and Merlin’s mouth moved, trying to catch Sherlock’s hand. “You'd do anything I asked right now, wouldn’t you?”

Merlin inhaled, shakily, and Sherlock rubbed the soft give under Merlin’s chin. “Even though you know where it’d leave you. You’d do anything just to be able to sleep at the end of my bed. You wouldn't get up and go, you wouldn't care about this so-called prophesized Doctor, you would follow me home, naked, right now, if I did what I promised. You’d give up this flat and everything in it without another thought just to live with me, just so you could have a few years where I do everything in my very extensive power to make you forget Arthur entirely.”

Merlin lashed his head away, jaw tensing and Sherlock laughed. “Of course I would. I don’t come in second to anyone.”

“I _can’t_ ,” Merlin said.

“But it’d dull it for a little while. It’d bring the world some clarity for a little while, and that’s what you want. You don’t care if I made you come to crime scenes on your knees. You wouldn’t even care if I killed someone for touching you. You say you do, but it’s there. So obvious. You’re so _obvious_ , how didn’t he notice?”

Merlin turned back to Sherlock and Sherlock kept his hands to himself. He looked at the clock. “He _did_ notice. He just couldn’t give it to you. It’s why you sleep with anyone else, because you know that even when he wakes up, he’ll sleep with you, but he won’t own you. He’ll be your friend, and he’ll tease you, but he won’t step back and bring his full attention to you for very long at all. He owns you more than anyone, but he won't _prove_ it.”

“Shut up.” Merlin said.

“No,” Sherlock replied. “Why should I? You want to hear every single aspect of how I would selfishly keep you all to myself. You want to know how I’d sleep on top of you, and wake if you so much as looked at the door. You want to know about how long I’d have you kneel next to me as I read so I could have your head in my lap. You want to know about how I would scratch over your scalp when you pleased me, and how I’d sound as I said _good boy_. You want to know about all the times when you'd get to suffer at my behest. You’re parched and starving and I’m telling you exactly how I’d feed you, if you were mine.”

Sherlock didn't even need to strain to pluck at each of Merlin’s mental hot spots. Merlin wanted to be owned. He wanted there to be no argument about who owned him. He'd go on his knees, and he’d put his arse in the air, and he’ll fight, kill, and maim to protect whomever owned him. He would be a wonderful asset to Sherlock, and he couldn't deny he wanted to have someone who couldn't leave. He wanted _Merlin_ never to leave. Someone who knew what Sherlock is and what he liked and that he deconstructs people like chemicals, and was willing to show it off. He was willing to _drip_ with marks of Sherlock’s ownership. He’d mewl and backtalk and fail in banal, human ways every day, and Sherlock would punish, condition, and manipulate Merlin into something resembling perfect.

Sherlock bent to press his cheek alongside Merlin’s, to feel the feverish heat of his skin, the sweat pebbling and dripping down from his forehead. He closed his eyes to hear the rough, fractured breaths Merlin couldn't seem to wrap his head around, the sounds that wiggled in his trachea, the minute muscle twitches in his jaw, around his eyes. “I would hurt you. Very likely, I would do harm to you. I would be terrible for you, and you’d come back for more, because you need to be hurt. I would know when you needed to be hurt better than you would, and I wouldn’t ask permission. I would be nothing like Arthur.”

Sherlock leaned back. “If you were mine, I’d make sure it would be impossible for you to forget it. You’d resent me, and you’d get angry, and one day you might even start setting up crimes to stop me from getting in a depression and ignoring you entirely. If you were mine, in the end, you wouldn’t recognize yourself. You'd never erase me.”

And that would be fine, because, Sherlock knew, Merlin doesn’t want to _be_ Merlin anymore. He was sick to death of it, and if he could be Sherlock’s, just for a few decades…if he could have a vacation from existing under his own power, then maybe he could survive until Arthur woke up again. Maybe he wouldn’t have to break himself apart. Sherlock, they both knew, would at least be very precise in what he removed. Surgical. Merlin would just rip himself to bits like a wolf pack. Sherlock reached and pushed his thumb into the mark he’d left on Merlin’s chest.

“You’d always smell like me, I’d make sure of it. I want people to subconsciously feel me on you. I would make you say it, I would order you to inform everyone that you were mine, and you would be humiliated. You’d flush and your heart would pound and you’d want to do anything but what you’d been told, want to just go through the normal motions of small talk, but you’d say it because you don't actually _care_ about what anyone thinks."

He continued talking. Talked about what he do to Merlin, he used clear, careful terms: he described how he’d whip him, where he’d aim and when he’d stop and what he’d use. He described where he’d pierce him—he’d do it himself, of course, he has the hand skills for it—where he’d leave metal buried under Merlin’s skin, and how he’d tug on the rings and tie Merlin inside the shower by his nipple, might forget him there and Merlin would stand in the cold water for him, would freeze and then look at Sherlock like the moon was rising when Sherlock came back in, when Sherlock unhooked him and turned off the water.

“If you were mine,” Sherlock finished, and Merlin had thrust his hips into empty air, and had fisted his hands and kicked a leg against the sheet, and had, eventually, calmed into a stupor of listening.

When Merlin came he didn't thrash and flail, he just ejaculated, but the rest of him didn't notice. He had come dripping from his forehead, running down a cheek, and thick and white on his belly. He was covered in it, breath coming harsh and fast, eyes trained on Sherlock, the slightest flutter the only sign he’d mentally registered that he’s gotten some relief. Sherlock did nothing to clean him off, left him lying like that, messy with Sherlock’s bite mark still furiously red on his chest

Sherlock just sat until the shudders running up Merlin’s body stopped and then he moved close to Merlin’s ear and added, “But I can’t own you, can I? You’d just be on loan.”

Sherlock stood to go shower, not even pausing to untie Merlin and he didn't need to hear Merlin to know that when he exhaled, it was with a single, shaky, “No.”

\---

Sherlock had taken a shower, and undressed and Merlin had made him a sandwich and a glass of milk. Instead of leaving Sherlock had stayed the day, picking through Merlin’s books and then laying out on the couch. Merlin had paused a moment then, slowly, came over and knelt next to the couch. Sherlock had put his hand in Merlin’s hair, smoothing through it as he read.

He doesn’t remember falling asleep.

When Sherlock woke the flat was empty. He was on the bed, but it’d been stripped, and wasn’t the same wooden monstrosity he’d been in when he'd fallen asleep. He stood and went to the door. He took down the note.

_Sherlock,_

_You Doctor is coming tomorrow. He has some space in his life for you. You can own him, if you want. He won't stop you. Not really, anyways._

_You can't give me what I want. But I made someone for you. Superheros can't exist in the real world. They need problems as big as they are. So. I made you a problem. I'd tell you to be careful, but you wouldn't listen._

__

Merlin

He folded the note into neat quarters, stuck it into his pocket next to his phone, and left the flat.


End file.
